Institutional Pathways for Transforming County-Level Cadres’ Performance Orientation in the Context of New Quality Productive Forces

A Comparative Case Study of Two Counties in Zhejiang Province, China

Abstract

The development of new quality productive forces has placed new demands on county-level development models and the logic of cadre performance evaluation. Transforming cadres’ performance orientation is therefore an important institutional guarantee for translating new quality productive forces into practice and promoting high-quality county-level development. From an institutional analysis perspective, this study examines the structural tensions between new quality productive forces and existing performance-evaluation logic. It conducts a comparative case study of Sanmen County and Yongjia County in Zhejiang Province, focusing respectively on institutional practices for correcting performance-orientation deviations and incentivizing innovation. The study finds that the innovative, long-term, and uncertain characteristics of new quality productive forces require county-level cadres to shift from pursuing short-term visible achievements toward accumulating long-term performance, from horizontal imitation toward development based on local conditions, and from scale expansion toward innovation and quality improvement. Accordingly, differentiated and longer-cycle performance evaluation mechanisms should be improved, while fault-tolerance and correction, clarification and reputation-protection, and related institutional arrangements should be strengthened to create an institutional environment in which constraints and incentives work in concert. These measures can encourage cadres to develop a performance orientation compatible with the development of new quality productive forces.